Predictions for the legislative election.

As fair warning, I have a miserable record when it comes to predicting elections. This started in 1979, when I was being bussed across town to public school telling my mates that Jimmy Carter was going to win a second term. I lost two bets, one on the last US presidential election and one on the Taiwanese presidential election of 2004. Brian Kennedy, the man I lost these bets to, according to many who have been on the losing end of these wagers, has an uncanny ability to call it right. He said, "Hyatt, you bet with your heart, not with your head." That's true most of the time.

So now that you have been warned, it looks like the pan-greens, the TSU and the DPP, will pick up enough seats to have a majority. I'm not really walking out on a limb here. The pan-blues are crumbling apart. A colleague and friend, I'll just call him "Papa," went to a press conference last week that was held for the Foreign Correspondents Club. There, four representatives, one from each of the major four parties, spoke with reporters about their campaigns and the issues that were driving this election. Papa asked the KMT representative a straightforward question, one that any politician should be able to field with ease, and got a bumbling jeremiad as a response. The question: "Most people are aware of the issues that the DPP stands for, contitutional reform, media reform, referendums, etc. Can you tell us in a few short phrases what the KMT's platform is? The man couldn't answer. This is why the pan-blues are lost. They are only anti-Chen parties now.